A new hurricane study published by researchers from Princeton University and NOAA put the kibosh on a popular pet theory pushed by global warming alarmists.

The pet theory: Pollution gets in the way of the sun hitting the oceans, dropping temperatures and therefore reducing hurricanes. But clean air acts that cleaned up pollution allowed more sun through and increased the oceans' temps and, subsequently, gave rise to more hurricanes.

Not so much, researchers found.

"Directly observed North Atlantic sulfate aerosol optical depth has not increased (but shows a modest decline) over this period, suggesting the decline of the Atlantic major hurricane frequency during 2005–2015 is not likely due to recent changes in anthropogenic sulfate aerosols," researchers wrote.

Instead, the 10-year decline in hurricanes stemmed from a "weakening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) inferred from ocean observations."